Here! Now! Imperative: not to be avoided: necessary. In a typical week, the show will cover not only all the big news stories, but also the stories behind the stories, or some of the less crucial but equally intriguing things happening in the world.

Here! Now! Imperative: not to be avoided: necessary. In a typical week, the show will cover not only all the big news stories, but also the stories behind the stories, or some of the less crucial but equally intriguing things happening in the world.

Cleveland is becoming a hub for testing new ways to fight HIV/AIDS after this week’s announcement of nearly $13 million dollars in new funding from the National Institutes of Health.

Case Western Reserve University and University Hospitals are recruiting people to take part in clinical trials to test new treatments for the disease and find new ways to prevent it. Co-director Dr. Benigno Rodriguez believes further research could bring the epidemic under control.

“If we continue to push the boundaries of what we’re doing, we can really bring transmission of HIV down to a level that is close to insignificant at least in the developed world. This will take much longer in developing countries, but it is a reasonable goal to attain within the next decade or so.”

Some of the treatments being tested are gel, foam or cream microbicides that could stop the transmission of HIV before it enters the body. Researchers hope to start testing those drugs on patients in clinical trials later this year.

The Cleveland Clinical Trials Unit is one of only two facilities in the U.S. to partner with three research networks – the national Adult AIDS Clinical Trials Group (ACTG), the Microbicide Trials Network (MTN) and the HIV Vaccine Trials Network (HVTN).

The Cleveland unit is also one of only 10 centers in the U.S. conducting clinical trials for the HIV Vaccine